George Work, professor of cello, holds the BM, MM, and the Performer's Certificate from the Eastman School of Music, where he also served as teaching assistant to Robert Sylvester. His principal teachers include Robert Sylvester, Paul Katz, Ronald Leonard, Gabor Rejto, and Carol Work. As a student, he participated in many well known music festivals, including Aspen, Music Academy of the West (where he received the 1979 Cello Award) and the highly selective Piatigorsky Seminar (1979.)

In 1981, he joined the Ames Piano Quartet, in residence at Iowa State University. The Quartet has released six critically acclaimed CD recordings, one on the Musical Heritage label, the others on Dorian Recordings, and has appeared in concert throughout the United States and Canada. International appearances include Salzburg, Austria, Paris and Marseilles, France, Taipei, Tainan, Kashiong and Taichung, Taiwan, and Merida, Mexico. The group has also been featured on NPR';s "Performance Today," WQXR's "The Listening Room," and has appeared on a special edition of "St. Paul Sunday" commemorating the 50th anniversary of WOI radio. This latter led to an invitation to tape a second "St. Paul Sunday," which aired nationally for the first time in November 1999. The recipient of a 1983 NEA grant, the Quartet has also been twice honored by ISU, first with the LAS Award for Excellence in 1993, and also with the University Award for Excellence in Creative Activity in 1999.

George Work has appeared as soloist with numerous orchestras in the Midwest, as well as in Taiwan, R.O.C. Critical reaction has included such phrases as "exciting, vibrant tone...an astounding ability at double stops," (Lincoln Journal, Lincoln, NE) and "beautifully and exquisitely played," (Pasadena Star Times, Pasadena, CA.) Mr. Work was a long time faculty member at the Lutheran Summer Music Program, where he was a founding member of its resident string quartet, the Omega Quartet. He has also taught at the University of Minnesota's "Bravo" summer program, and served as adjunct professor of cello at Drake University during the 1997-98 school year. He was the founder of Iowa State University's Summer Chamber Music Workshop and its director from 1993-1999. A faculty member at the a Brevard Music Center in North Carolina since 1998, George Work was also chosen to be an artist faculty member at the first ever Schlern International Music Festival, held in Voels am Schlern, Italy, in the summer of 2003.

Mr. Work was the recipient of the 1991 ISTA "Studio Teacher of the Year" award. His students have been award winners at the Lucy Palermo Weed and IMTA State and Divisional Competitions and have gone on to study at various prestigious music schools, including Eastman, Oberlin, and Indiana University.